Áilín Quinlan: I had a €165 ticket for Bob Dylan...but never got to see him
But also how the night restored my faith in the kindness and humanity of the Irish people.
Two €165 tickets purchased months beforehand got us great seats, high-up. En route to the venue, we played the songs the megastar was expected to perform.
My husband was thrilled to be told that Dylan might also play that night in tribute to Paul Brady.
We enjoyed a smashing dinner and made it into our seats 20 minutes before the great man appeared on stage. This would be a night to remember!
As the enormous arena filled up, the air warmed rapidly. I removed the lightweight gilet I was wearing. Then the thin fleece underneath.
Now I was down to a light cotton tee-shirt.
Ten minutes before Dylan was due on stage, several thousand were seated and the concert hall was steaming.
Moisture broke out on my forehead. My hair and the back of my tee-shirt were damp.
Five minutes.
I had to pop out for a second, I whispered. My husband barely noticed; he was chatting to the lifelong Dylan fan on his left.
“It’s getting a bit warm in there,” I said to the security guard on duty outside the door. “Will any air conditioning come on?”
“No”, he said.
Down at the main entrance lobby, more security staff told me I’d need to get my wrist stamped if I was temporarily leaving the venue.
By now I was flushed, sweating heavily, and beginning to feel a bit sick.
I got stamped.
As I walked around seeking an exit, a tall security guard, a local man, eyed me curiously.
“Are you alright?” he inquired.
“It’s very hot and crowded up there,” I told him bleakly.
“Ah, well, love, it’s a concert, like,” he said kindly.
“I know,” I said humbly.
“But I’m roasted. I need cold air.”
“No problem. I’ll get someone,” he said.
He put a finger to his earpiece.
“Timmy,” he said quietly, “come in, Timmy.”
I was head-to-toe in clammy sweat and my heart was pumping.
“Yerra,” I said, “leave Timmy at it – just point me to the nearest exit.”
I threw myself out onto a chilly November patio, where two men were talking fishing.
Got a beaker of iced water from the bar and sat in a thin cotton tee shirt and light trousers, swigging the water, giving off steam and talking to a woman sitting nearby having a fag.
She was on her break, she said chattily; what was I doing out here with Bob Dylan singing his heart out on stage?
The heat, I told her.
Ah, she said, are ya in the middle of it?
I’m supposed to be out the gap, I said, “but the hot flashes always seem to come back after my birthday.”
She’d started in her late forties, she said.
“It’d drive you nuts,” she observed.
Neither of us needed to mention the m-word.
Another uniformed staffer appeared and threw herself down on a seat with a sigh of relief.
“I’ve only got 10 minutes, girls,” she said and lit a fag.
“Hey, I saw you coming out earlier,” she said to me in the local accent.
“What’s wrong with ya?”
I told her about the heat and the crowds and the sweat.
“God, she said, not needing to mention the m-word either, it’s a killer, isn’t it?”
“Yeah”, I said guiltily, as we listened to the distant pounding of Bob Dylan.
“ My husband’s sitting upstairs on his own after spending €165 on a ticket for me.”
We all sighed.
“What can ya do?” they said comfortably.
Suddenly, I felt so much better.
All too soon they had to get back to work.
“Listen, girl,” they said as they heaved themselves up.
“If you start to feel worse, come and find us just inside the main doors. We’re trained.”
I didn’t need their training, I told them. Their kindness had been everything.
Later, I ventured inside again and met another employee. She’d seen me going in and out a bit, she observed kindly; was I okay?
“God, ye must all think I’m nuts,” I said, mortified.
“We do not,” she said.
She led me past the tall security guard, who nodded in recognition.
“Alright now, are ya?” he asked.
I was, I said, as we pushed through more doors into a darkish area from where I could see quite a lot of the stage. The main thing was, it was cool. And there was a chair.
I thanked her.
God, the relief.
“Did you get to see Dylan?” she asked when I came over to thank her afterwards.
“Was he the fella in the black hat?” I asked.
She snorted a laugh.
“No,” she said.
“Stay there.”
She vanished for a minute, returning with a thick rolled-up paper cylinder.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“A few concert posters, seeing as you didn’t even get to see the man,” she said, grinning.
“What were you doing all bloody night?” my husband asked a bit crossly when we met up after the show.
Turned out that Dylan sang too many obscure songs for his liking; lots of dirges.
Plus, when the star performed some better-known melodies, he did such a different take on them, my husband said, that they were scarcely recognisable.
Plus, he basically ignored the audience.
Plus, he didn’t perform !
Plus, my husband had to sit on his own all night!
He was planning on going to Mick Flannery in the Everyman next May, but this time he’d be buying one ticket. One!
“I’m really sorry,” I said humbly.
I handed him the posters.
“Hmph,” he said, somewhat mollified.
As we left, the tall security guard winked.
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